OBS Chapter 534 Mobilization
Chapter 534 Mobilization
The wooden beams of the parish school creaked slightly in the cold wind, and the candles in the iron candlesticks shed tears, stretching Minzer's shadow against the mottled lime wall, with miners, woodcutters and peasant women crowded below.
The previous conscription and taxation operations caused everyone in this town to lose their property or loved ones, so even though they had conflicts with each other in the past, everyone came here now just to hear how Min Caier, one of the few intellectuals in the town, would fight against those people.
"Now that everyone is here, I will start talking about what I want to say."
Min Caier said:
"First, I want you to understand why you should resist."
There was a confused buzz from the audience, and the blacksmith stared blankly:
"Why should we resist? Is there any need to ask? They are taking our children and our money..."
Old Bob the lumberjack tapped his knee with the handle of his axe:
"I was robbed this morning, and now I want to hear how to fight those officials!"
Min Caier suddenly raised his hand to signal for silence, his eyes sweeping across every weather-beaten face:
"In that case, I'll let you see it with your own eyes."
He pointed to a chair with a faded cushion in the back row.
"Old Bob, come up and sit here."
Old Bob walked onto the stage, scratching his shaggy beard, and sat down on the chair without thinking.
"Boom!"
The sudden cracking sound startled Old Bob, and at the same time he felt his butt was wet. He gritted his teeth and propped himself up. When he lifted the cushion, egg yolk was flowing down the wooden cracks, leaving dark yellow stains on his linen trousers.
"You broke my eggs, pay me now!"
Min Ze'er suddenly shouted, picked up the parchment roll on the table and hit Bob on the chest.
"It's just an egg, how many copper coins will I give you as compensation?"
Old Bob said in great confusion.
"How many copper coins? Butler, come up and report!"
"I'm coming."
Walden, who was pretending to be the butler, came up, picked up the account book and said in a serious manner:
"Although this egg is only worth a few copper coins, suppose this egg gave birth to a hen, and the hen laid three eggs when it grew up, and these three eggs gave birth to three hens, and each hen laid three eggs when it grew up."
"That's it. When these hens grow up, there will be 13 hens. In addition to the cost of feeding, lodging, medicine, and hiring a caretaker for these hens, you must give at least one gold coin."
He shook out the parchment, which was covered with crooked pictures of chicken coops and hens.
"What the hell?"
Old Bob's eyes widened.
"You want to kill me just for a broken egg? Who would believe such nonsense?"
"Well."
Minzer continued:
"Take me to court!"
Muenzer waved his hand, and Walden, pretending to be the judge, immediately stepped forward and said:
"I think the plaintiff's request is reasonable and I order the defendant to compensate immediately!"
"I don't have any money!"
Bob slammed his fist on the ledger.
"No money? That's easy!"
Min Caier suddenly changed his tone to a dignified one and pulled out a crumpled piece of parchment from his sleeve.
"Sign this 'Voluntary Labor Contract' and be my serf for the rest of your life, and the debt will be written off."
The classroom burst into laughter. The blacksmith laughed so hard that he slapped his thigh. Even the old miner who was coughing in the corner couldn't straighten his back.
Bob stood there in a daze, and suddenly kicked over the chair:
"If this is true, I will have to pay for everything I have left!"
Seeing Old Bob at a loss, Minzer stopped the show and asked Old Bob:
"Do you think what I just did was reasonable?"
"What's so reasonable about that? It's just too bullying!"
Old Bob said angrily.
"It's unreasonable."
Min Caier asked everyone:
"Has anyone here ever encountered something similar?"
Someone immediately responded:
"I have something to say about this. Last time a miner died in the mine, the mine owner sent by the higher-ups only paid two bags of coal as compensation, and said that if we felt it was too little, we could go to the court in Padua and sue him. How could we afford to sue him? Coal is expensive, but the lives of miners are worthless!"
"Yes."
Another miner said:
"We can't even buy the coal from our mines ourselves, so I once again had to transport coal to the city. The local Chamber of Commerce gave fifty silver coins for a cartload of coal. When we sell it, it will probably be even more expensive. When we get home, we can only pick up branches or coal slag to burn."
"The tax collectors from Padua are even more ruthless."
A peasant woman lifted the corner of her apron, revealing purple whip marks on her calves.
"They said my family owed thirty silver coins in 'light tax', but I can't even afford to light a candle..."
Min Zeer grabbed the Yoda Codex on the podium and said to the crowd:
"I studied the new Yoda Law, and it all comes down to this: 'Use our money and our children to fight for those nobles!'"
"At the same time, there are no laws in the past that can guarantee the minimum living needs of the lower-class people in Yoda. At the same time, the noble officials who make laws basically exploit legal loopholes or trample on the law in various situations."
"So, in the Yoda Empire, if we just rely on reasoning, it won't work at all. Only by uniting and facing the outside world together can we protect our own interests forever."
"You may have heard of the peasant uprisings in the past. Many of them involved thousands or even tens of thousands of people. However, the nobles said they would consider the peasants' needs when they saw that they could not defeat them. After the peasants returned to their homes, they sent troops to arrest and kill the leaders of the uprising, and tortured and exiled the people to make them suffer."
"I've said so much here just to remind everyone that if you want to resist, then resist to the end. Don't wait until the other side makes a verbal promise to us and then disperse. If you do that, only death and greater humiliation await us."
After a moment of silence, someone in the crowd shouted:
"Those conscription officers and tax collectors will be here sooner or later anyway, so why not fight them and beat them back to death!"
"That's it! For the sake of our children, we can't continue to suffer like this!"
After hearing the opinions from the crowd, Minzer signaled everyone to be quiet, and then solemnly announced:
"Well, now that everyone is determined to resist, I will announce the plan next."
"It is obvious that if we resist now, we will be doomed. Both the Overseers and the Blackwatch mercenaries who are there to maintain stability can defeat us."
"So we have several stages. First, everyone should do their work. But if those officials have any extremely unreasonable demands, such as deducting most of the salary or asking for a lot of extra working hours, then we should unite and not go to work."
"At the same time, blacksmiths need to secretly forge some simple weapons, such as spears, and some people need to go to other villages to inform those who want to rebel."
"Next, we will wait for news from outside. Right now, peasant uprisings are in full swing in various places. When the standing army is too busy suppressing the peasant uprisings to suppress them, we will gather here to distribute weapons, and then take control of the logging camps and mines outside the town and all the officials and supervisors inside."
"Finally, mobilize the people of the villages and towns near Padua, gather together to surround Padua, and force the other side to recognize our interests and return our relatives and property. Of course, even if they fulfill their promise, we will not disband our army!"
Min Caier looked around at everyone, the candlelight flickering in his eyes:
"Remember! Once you start, there is no turning back! Either win back the land and your loved ones, or die on the way to the charge!"
“For the children!”
I don't know who shouted.
"To survive!"
another man yelled.
The shouts exploded in the classroom, making the window frames buzz.
Min Caier looked at this group of former strangers who now rolled up their sleeves to reveal their scars and folded their rough palms into fists, and sighed in his heart.
In preparing this plan, he read a lot of books and newspapers from Helderland. It must be said that the strategies on how to mobilize all residents to resist the invasion of Yoda's army and organize guerrilla warfare in enemy-occupied areas really appealed to him. However, due to various resource constraints, he could only carry out small-scale uprisings now.
Whether it will be successful or not depends on the God of Light.